Mothers advocate for water filters at Portsmouth, NH schools

“PORTSMOUTH – The three mothers who founded the Testing for Pease environmental advocacy group appeared at City Hall on Monday to push the City Council to install water filters at city schools.

Andrea Amico of Portsmouth, one of the three Testing for Pease co-founders, told the council that two of her children and her husband were exposed to high levels of PFAS chemicals in the city’s Haven well at the former Pease Air Force Base.

She pointed out that low levels of PFAS chemicals have been found in other city wells, which means that children in city schools can be exposed to them.

‘We want the city to consider filtering the schools (and) prevent children from being exposed from chemicals even at low levels,’ Amico said during a round table discussion with the council and some city staff before Monday’s meeting.

She told the council that her 7-year-old daughter already has ‘really high levels’ of PFAS chemicals in her blood, and is now attending the Dondero School…

At home, Amico can ‘make choices to prevent that exposure, at school I really can’t’…

Amico told the City Council that other states have lowered their health advisory levels below 70 parts per trillion.

She also noted that ‘even low levels of PFAS chemicals can cause health effects in humans.’

Testing for Pease co-founder Alayna Davis told the City Council that ‘children are more vulnerable to toxins’ than adults.

‘They bio accumulate in your body but they also take decades to eliminate,’ Davis said.

By not putting water filters in the schools, ‘children are continuing to be exposed and there’s no known method to take them out of your body,’ Davis said about PFAS chemicals.”